I am pleased to annouce that the recipient of the Fourth Annual Leslie Eliason
Excellence in Teaching Award is Professor Laura Burian. Professor Burian has
a record of excellence in teaching and an ongoing, inspiring commitment to
providing our students the highest quality education possible. She has a
wonderful rapport with her colleagues and students, an exceptional teaching
record that reflects her ability to provide an excellent learning experience
to our students, and an intensive commitment to the Institute’s mission.

As a professor dedicated to her students and to delivering quality education,
Professor Burian embodies much of what Professor Eliason also dedicated her
teaching efforts towards. Leslie Eliason was a strong woman, dynamic and
passionate about her chosen profession of teaching.
She pursued her responsibilities as a teacher and mentor with great warmth and
care for her students and colleagues, reflecting her intelligence, integrity,
good humore, and commitment to quality in all of her endeavors.
Professor Burian has a similar thoroughness in her role as teacher, colleague,
mentor and advisor. As was true for Professor Eliason, Professor Burian is
interested in building the capacities of her students, in helping them and the
Institute reach their greatest potential, and in working collaboratively with
her colleagues to achieve their goals. There is no question that Professor
Burian reflects the qualities Professor Eliason valued the most — hard work,
intense and at times passionate commitment to students and sound academic
programming, and good colleagial interactions and collaborations. Her
commitment to excellence both inside and outside of the classroom is greatly
appreciated and valued.

Congratulations to Professor Burian — we will celebrate her selection on
April 21st during the “quiet hours” at lunchtime in the Samson Center Reading
Room. More details will follow about this celebration.

Thanks to all of you who nominated faculty for this award and helped in the
selection process.

The MAP Peer Mentor Program is looking for mentors for the Fall 2009 semester. We have many new students coming this fall, please take advantage of this exciting opportunity to be a peer mentor by applying online at http://www.miis.edu/saffairs_map_mentor.html !

I am very pleased to announce that Dr. Bruce Paton will be the Chair of the Fisher Program of International Business (Fisher International MBA). The decision has been made after deliberation and consultation with President Sunder Ramaswamy, Provost Amy Sands, the Fisher Faculty and Staff, and the incoming Program Chairs of the Graduate School of International Policy and Management.

Dr. Bruce Paton is Visiting Associate Professor of Sustainable Business and Strategy at the Monterey Institute. He is Associate Professor at San Francisco State University’s College of Business, where he teaches courses on corporate social responsibility and sustainable business at undergraduate, graduate, and executive levels. He was named the Teaching Professor of the Year for the College of Business in 2005. He has also been an Adjunct Professor at Monterey Institute since 2002. Dr. Paton has been actively involved in curriculum reform at SF State. He served on a Dean’s Taskforce on Graduate Programs that led to streamlined MBA program requirements. He also chaired the Undergraduate Curriculum Committee during its preparation for the AACSB’s re-accreditation process. Dr. Paton currently serves as Board Chair for Sustainable Silicon Valley, a collaboration of nearly 100 businesses, cities, and community organizations that works to focus the region’s leaders on its most important environmental challenges and opportunities. He also serves on the International Planning Board for the Greening of Industry Network, and on the editorial board for the Journal, Business Strategy and Environment.

Dr. Paton focuses his research on business strategies and public policies for sustainability, especially the development of methods for designing and evaluating voluntary and collaborative initiatives to address social and environmental issues in management. His research and teaching draw on more than twenty years of decision-making experience in industry, government and higher education, including the District of Columbia government, an environmental policy consulting firm, Hewlett-Packard, and a Silicon Valley startup. He also served for two years as Director of Admissions for the MBA Program at Stanford University. Dr. Paton holds a BA in Environmental Science from Wesleyan University, an MBA from Stanford University, and a Ph.D. in Environmental Studies from the University of California, Santa Cruz.

Limited funds have been made available for additional scholarship support for
students returning for the 2009/2010 academic year. These funds will be
awarded on the basis of merit, levels of educational debt and financial need.

Applications must be submitted via email (finaid@miis.edu) to the Office of
Student Financial Planning.

The deadline to apply is 4:00pm Friday, May 22, 2009.

Any student meeting the following criteria is eligible to apply:

a) Must have a Minimum Cumulative GPA of 3.4 at the Monterey Institute
b) Must be a full-time student
c) Must demonstrate evidence of financial need and/or high levels of existing
educational debt-

US Citizens and Permanent Residents must complete the 2009-10 FAFSA and the
MIIS financial aid application to be considered

To apply, please describe your financial situation and your reasons for
requesting additional support in 400 words or less. Students who apply for
these funds will be notified via email no later than June 15, 2009.

Nonviolence advocate Maya Soetoro-Ng will address Institute students, faculty and staff on the topic “Conflict Resolution, Peacebuilding and Education” on Thursday from 1:00 pm to 2:00 pm in the Irvine Auditorium.In addition to her work on nonviolent conflict resolution, last fall Soetoro-Ng spoke at the Democratic National Convention in support of her half-brother Barack Obama’s candidacy for president.Soetoro-Ng serves on the International Advisory Board of Global Majority, a nonprofit organization started by former Institute students and faculty that is dedicated to promoting nonviolent conflict resolution education, mediation and advocacy.

All Institute students, faculty and staff are invited to attend.A question and answer session will follow, and a podcast of the event will also be posted to the Institute’s iTunesU site afterwards.

There are many different sources of information on the Monterey Institute campus today, and it can be challenging to find the information you are looking for in a timely manner. In response to this problem, we recently implemented a new solution that uses RSS feeds to channel information into a single central campus information resource.

This new resource is a campus information portal located on our Moodle site at elearning.miis.edu<http://www.elearning.miis.edu/>.The revamped Moodle site now incorporates the master events calendar and a list of the most recent articles published on our new campus-wide blog aggregator, the Monterey Institute Focus.The Focus, located at www.miisfocus.com<http://www.miisfocus.com/>, collects posts from a wide range of campus-based blogs into a single, comprehensive information resource that also feeds directly onto the Moodle home page.

In the near future, Ashley Arrocha will be providing instructions to student clubs on how to set up blogs and/or submit stories directly to the Monterey Institute Focus.

The portal accomplishes many of our key goals regarding funneling campus information into a single point of contact for campus community members that will continue to be enhanced and improved.